


The Boy in the Basement

by 1bad_joke



Series: The Boy in the Box [2]
Category: Supernatural RPF
Genre: Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Bottom Jensen Ackles, Choking, Crossdressing, Dark Jared Padalecki, Delusions, Kidnapping, Lingerie, Lovesickness, M/M, Mild Blood, Non-Consensual Drug Use, Older Jared Padalecki, Possessive Behavior, Restraints, Top Jared Padalecki, Unrequited Love, Unstable!Jared, Younger Jensen Ackles, blink and you miss it drunk driving, poetic allusion to cannibalism, twink!Jensen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-06
Updated: 2020-06-06
Packaged: 2021-03-04 03:14:00
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,604
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24566731
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/1bad_joke/pseuds/1bad_joke
Summary: A continuation of The Boy in the Box.Jared brings Jensen to their new home. With dreams of happily ever after in mind, Jared discovers things are not going according to plan, especially when Jensen keeps trying to escape and screams for Jared to let him go.(The non con isn't terribly explicit, but I've added what paragraph to avoid  just in case.)
Relationships: Jensen Ackles/Jared Padalecki
Series: The Boy in the Box [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1775725
Comments: 20
Kudos: 55





	The Boy in the Basement

**Author's Note:**

> Please, please read the tags.
> 
> I understand this fic won't be everyone's cup of tea. If you would like to avoid the explicit non-con scene, skip the paragraph beginning with, "Despite his best efforts" and resume again at "Heaven on earth." 
> 
> There's so much going on in the world today, a lot of bad with a glimmer of light for the betterment of our society. I hope I can provide some distraction and entertainment for a little while. With that said, I hope you -skimming over the tags- enjoy?

_I hope it's love. I'm trying really hard to make it love._

Richard Siken

Self-Portrait Against Red Wallpaper

Forty minutes on the road. Three tolls. One stop at a gas station where a kindly old lady comments on the boy angel in his front seat and the handsome couple they make. She sees through the windshield Jared's hand caress a marble smooth cheek before stepping out to fill the tank. Her Earl was the same way, she reminisces with a loving pat to the roof of her powder blue Caddy and a thin, peach lip grin. Sweet on her like newlyweds for fifty two years. Jared lets her know he plans to do the same. Forever. Her eyes twinkle under the fluorescence.

“He's lucky to have you,” she says as the pump clicks.

As he closes everything up, he can't help but agree. His smile a small, absent fixture on his face when he climbs back into the car. His movements jostle and only long, long lashes flutter in response. His own fingers twine with cool, slack ones. The warm tingle of a perfect fit.

They pull back onto the highway for a spell then Exit thirty four and miles of back roads until they pull up the long drive of their destination. Through all this, Jensen sleeps.

He sleeps through the crunch-crunch-crunch of Jared's shoes to the front door. He sleeps through the bridal-style carry inside and Jared's happy, blown out breath of crossing over the threshold into the home they are going to share. Together. The lights stagger on a dim, haunted yellow. He'd have to get bulbs.

Jensen keeps sleeping all the way upstairs to the master bedroom to be gently placed on the stripped bare, king-size mattress. The springs groan under their weight. He gathers the limp body close to him. Jensen's warm, not as warm as the sluggish wet rose blossom on the back of his head, painting Jared's carding fingers sticky red. Jared worries, but Jensen's breathing. He counts his slow breaths. Eighteen breaths this past minute, and Jared forces his lungs to sync.

One living, breathing mass.

Happy. They were going to be happy.

He thinks of the small bedlam that brought them here with Jensen sleeping instead of awake with Jared and planning their future together. His mouth goes sour like he can taste the bottom of his stomach. He squeezes Jensen's lax form closer to him.

That... that was all a misunderstanding. Jensen had been confused. Jared is going to remind him. To fix it. Yes. But first Jared has to patch Jensen up after his little spill in the alley behind the shop he works-- worked. Jensen wouldn't be returning. Their life is here now.

When he slips out from under the nothing weight of Jensen, he does so with a lot of longing touches and smoothing hands over wrinkled clothes. Through the clothes there's bone and muscle and warm, warm skin. His blood heats. What a wonder it is to touch. He can touch and feel his angel. Jared pities the man he was before who believed he could never, ever touch. He wonders now how he could ever possibly stop. Except he has to, for now. His eyes linger long after his hands.

The car door slams shut. Outside, Jensen's bag in hand, he stops short at gut punch nostalgia. Fireflies glow in neon spots in the yawning field surrounding him. Everything painted in shades of indigo and black in the coming night. He can almost see himself along with Meg and Jeff chasing after the spasmodic orbs armed with mason jars until they were called back in to clean up for bed. At the center of it all stands the white two story he grew up in. A little grayer now from weather and age. It's been years since he's been here. After his mom got sick, his dad had followed his mom to the grave like he couldn't stand to be away from her. That left the property and its possessions to Jared and his two siblings. After they had picked through the carcass of their childhood home like vultures in search of items of value, Jared had bought them out, keeping the house solely in his name. He kept it, because he always hoped to settle down here, somewhere peaceful and quiet and secluded, where all he needs is that one person to have all to himself and spend the rest of their lives with. His wife had wanted the suburbs where all of her family and friends are. Back then, it's probably how he knew.

If it's true love, you don't need anyone else but your soul mate.

Jared knows his parents are smiling down on him for making his dream come true, because he and Jensen are going to be happy like his parents were. Even more so.

His phone buzzes again with another call from his wife. He turns it off entirely to avoid the second wave of messages after his short text declaring he won't be returning to their house that night. Things had changed. He's changed. He's looking forward to his life again.

The dust and cobwebs need to be swept away, windows in need of a good scrubbing, and the hardwood floors could do with a heavy mopping and shine. A mustiness hangs thick in the air and tickles his nose. Sheets are thrown over scattered furniture in each room; they loom like ghosts. The stairs creek under his quick steps.

Jensen is right where he left them. Still and quiet like a sleeping beauty should. He thinks of stealing a kiss, but that feels wrong. He wants to do this right. Their romance has time now. Jared's hand rests on the rise and fall of his chest, jealous of the air in his lungs. The steady _boom-boom, boom-boom_ travels up his arm as a slow-rolling heroin hit. He hopes Jensen wakes up soon.

Back resting against the bedside, Jared settles on the floor and carefully extracts the items in Jensen's worn thin backpack. Treasure finds. Make up wipes, mascara, drug store red lipstick, a stub of black eyeliner, a clam-shell case when opened sparkles and shimmers in the low lamp light, a sad keyring claiming one lonely key, and a balled up cream negligee. His fingers trace the lace trim and the smattering of wrinkles in the fabric. This one is new to Jared but smells heavily of fabric softener, of cologne, a scent he is relearning as uniquely Jensen.

Towards the bottom of the bag, his scarred fingertips brush silk. He doesn't mean to gasp while his mouth goes dry. Laying in a twisted knot in his palm is pure white -Snow White- panties. The silk glows. They're soft in his hand and even softer against the tip of his nose and the flare of his nostrils. Something warm and musky fills his lungs. The secret of it pierces a hot spike through him; it dithers between lust and shame. Shame drops the undergarment from his nose, but lust keeps it close as it tangles around his fist and cradles his knuckles.

The last couple items he finds are a worn soft pamphlet to a local college and a wallet, basic brown and beaten to hell. No cell phone to be found, not in any of the pockets or on Jensen himself. A peek into his wallet offers the suggestion he probably can't afford one. Four dollars, six nickels, and a crusty penny. Two hole punches away from a free sub sandwich at a small, local chain. A state ID: Jensen Ackles. Blond hair, green eyes, one hundred sixty five pounds, and an organ donor. The picture is flash-bright and washes out Jensen's freckles. He's twenty. Jared missed his birthday -March first- but he'd make up for it next year. The address listed is on the sketchier side of town. Good thing Jensen won't ever have to go back there. Jared tucks the ID into his own wallet.

Behind him, barely there movement rustles. He pushes to his knees. Previously on his back, the boy rolls onto his side, his closed eyes squeezing with brows drawn and mouth pouty. Slowly, so slowly, emerald dark eyes slit open then immediately slam shut. A hiss leaves straight, white teeth.

Jared, in awe, doesn't breathe. Who could remember to faced with this? Jensen's hands reach back to cup the cracked goose egg on his head. A thready groan rattles from him then. The sound breaks Jared's fit to bursting heart. He scrambles to his feet and onto the mattress, gingerly guiding the boy's questing fingers away, the pair of panties tangled around Jared's fist grazing his skin. Sweet shushes and sympathetic croons rain down.

“No, no, darlin', don't touch.” He should have taken care of this; he'd just been so distracted. “Lay still, and I'll go see if I can find you something for that.”

Jensen doesn't respond but seems to listen to Jared's instruction and he doesn't seem to have moved during Jared's quick ransack of the house. Clasped shut in pain, his eyes don't open at Jared's approach. He only flinches with a tight-lipped grunt at the cool, damp rag pressed gently to his head. Jared holds it there as Jensen makes several failed attempts to properly open his swimming eyes.

His voice when he speaks is a weak rasp, every word seeming to pain him. “What happened? … Am I in the hospital?”

“It's okay now,” Jared assures in a hushed tone. “You tripped and bumped your head, but you're safe now. I've got you.”

“I did?” Jensen frowns cutely. “Are you the doctor?”

“I'm not,” he admits, because he's honest and doesn't ever want to lie to his boy. Jensen doesn't need a doctor anyway; he has Jared. “But I'll get you fixed up in no time. Here, I found some Aspirin.”

He found them in the hall bathroom's medicine cabinet. Expired, but paired with tap water out of an old, chipped mug would have to do. He helps Jensen sit up long enough to reverently place the two tablets past plush lips and onto a hot, wet tongue. Jared's fingers falter there before withdrawing to bring the cup to his mouth to drink. Jensen gulps hard -throat working- and Jared watches on with adoration. Once finished, Jensen lays back on a gasp. His face is still screwed in pain but his body relaxes more into the mattress. Jared resists the urge to disturb him anymore when all he wants to do is hug him and kiss him and ask everything about him like facts urgently needed to be devoured.

“You need to rest,” he murmurs instead. They have all the time in the world for all that stuff. Jensen's answering drowsy hum makes it even harder to leave him, if only for a little while.

The all night grocery store is a God send for stocking the kitchen and replenishing the linens. He collects bandages, antibiotic ointment, and painkillers. He dawdles in the aisle containing condoms and lube. Were condoms necessary? Jared is clean, after all, and Jensen can only be a virgin. He has to be, because the thought of anyone having touched what is Jared's boils his blood and grinds his teeth and acid eats away at his senses, vision, hearing, taste, oxygen turns acrid--

The box of Trojans in his grasp crunches. Concave and dented. Smoothing his hair back with a shaky hand, he returns the battered item to the shelf. No one's around to witness a bottle of KY land violently in the cart before he moves on.

He waits in line at the only register open behind a group of teenage boys buying their scrawny weights in junk food and energy drinks. He turns on his phone while the scanner beeps Red Bulls and Flaming Hot Cheetos. His thumb swipes away the notifications of missed calls and text messages. He fires off an email to work taking a few more vacation days. The teens count change and bicker amongst each other. A yawn swells in his throat, and he swallows it down.

“Find everything okay?” the cashier asks, already at work scanning his items. He flashes a tight grin but doesn't say anything. A nagging impatience grows in him the longer his internal clock tells him he's been away from Jensen. He misses the amount, choosing instead to simply swipe his debit card and collect his bags as quickly as possible.

He hadn't thought ahead to the fact the refrigerator has been sitting unplugged for years. The interior smells, but he plugs it in and crosses his fingers the food doesn't spoil. With more food in the pantry, a small dish set dripping clean on a drying wrack beside the sink, and cleaning supplies piled in the corner, the kitchen is the start to building a home and his excitement is only tempered by another yawn. He trudges up the stairs with fluffy new pillows squished under one arm, sheets -temporary because his angel deserves a much higher thread count- tucked under the other, and the bag of medical supplies dangling from his pinkie.

At the top, his prize is still fast asleep in their bed, having curled up into a shivering ball in his absence. He tiptoes into the room. Preferring to wash the bed linens before use, he compromises with unzipping the dark comforter from its plastic case and carefully draping it over his cold angel. A pillow -bare for now- is nudged beneath Jensen's heavy head until Jensen's own sluggish arms hug it close as he continues on dreaming. Never before had Jared wanted to be a pillow so badly. He then makes quick work to do his best to patch up the bump on Jensen's head, taping down the edges and wiping the goo of the ointment off on his pants.

For now, he collects Jensen's possessions off the floor and tucks them away into a dress drawer, fussing longer than necessary over the arrangement of the nightie and thong. It closes with a muffled _snick_. His fingers leave the time-smooth knob to trace the filigree carved into the front panel. This used to be his mother's; now it gets to belong to the boy snuffling softly behind him.

Flipping off the lamp with only the moonlight pouring in through the open window, he molds his body along Jensen's spine while being careful not to disturb him. Jared breathes him in. The long day catches up to him, eyelids going heavy. Before drifting off, copper-crusty locks of hair tickles his lips.

“We're gonna be so happy together,” he whispers and knows it to be true.

:::

“What the fuck!”

Disjointed dreams of colors and lace burn away at the morning light that floods his eyes, and the body in his arms tears away from him. He blinks, his fuzzy mind clearing.

Green, green, terrified green eyes. Jensen scuttles to the edge of the mattress, putting cold space between them.

“What happened? What's going on?” His voice tense and sleep rough. He looks wildly around the room before settling on Jared's stifled yawn. “Where am I?”

Pushing himself to sit up on the bed, he ignores the boy's twitching reaction and offers a syrupy sweet grin. “Everything's okay. You're safe, remember? I took care of you. Jensen, you're home now.”

Jensen's head is already shaking in denial. He winces. His fingers reach back to prod at the bandage there. His mouth works around his racing thoughts. Jared sits patiently as squinted eyes drill into him until they spring open in something akin to horror, which can't be right--

“You...” he gasps. His pale complexion goes impossibly white. His freckles stand out like blood spatter. “You're that creep from the store. Shit, did you-- did you knock me out and kidnap me?”

Jared's grin goes rictus stiff. It cracks a little. “You tripped.”

“You attacked me!” Jensen staggers from the bed, and his newborn colt knees collapse under him. His palm slaps to his mouth as pasty white goes seasick green. He scrambles back from Jared's instinctive lunge to go help. His back thumps against the wall beside the open window. His skinny chest moving fast. Jared tries to reach out, and Jensen tries to merge with the wall at his spine.

“Stay back!” barks through the tight seal of his palm.

Jared's searching fingers curl into claws and his hand withdraws as a fist into his lap. He's shaking, he realizes, and it's not from the fresh breeze caressing the rising temperature beneath his skin. His smiles withers into a pale slash.

“You must be hungry,” he voices more for the distraction of the statement than the truth of it. “I'll just go make... yeah.” Jared trudges to the door, mindful of terrified green tracking his every reluctant step. They're the last things he sees before he draws the door shut behind him.

The two-story straight drop to gravel-strewn ground from the open window springs to mind. He hears rustling through the door. Gut instinct has him reaching for the key in his pocket, because his father was a funny guy and was very serious about curfews, even with his mama. He jams it into the lock and turns it right before the knob starts to angrily rattle and shake.

Muffled shouts and pounding fists follow him downstairs and serves as the soundtrack to his breakfast preparation.

:::

This isn't at all like he imagined.

Jensen won't eat.

Their meals together are one-sided affairs of Jared's silverware clinking against his plate while Jensen's goes untouched. Sitting there hunched and small and glaring. After the first time the boy tries to stab him, the forks and knives are put away and Jared adjusts the menu to be more finger-friendly.

Jensen won't talk to him.

… at least not about things that matter. He pleads for Jared to let him go.

“I-I know that you didn't mean to hurt me before. That this is all just one big mistake, yeah?” His tremulous smile radiant through his tears. “If you take me back, I won't tell anyone about this, I promise. Just please, please let me go. I just wanna go home.”

Instances such as that are met with a soft smile and the even softer reminder that he is home now. Just the other day Jared had gone to his old apartment to pack up what little there was of Jensen's stuff and left the key. The place was a dump in the shape of a shoe box; he's much better off with Jared. That forty five minute drive to and from including the fifteen minutes it took to pack was the most stressful of his life being away for so long. He'd left Jensen napping but found him covered in bruises from throwing himself at the unyielding door. There's always bruises marring his pale skin. It makes Jared sad to see them; the hunger, secondary.

Sometimes, Jensen spews vitriol. Stuttered, cutting, most times quiet remarks regarding how much a pathetic psycho Jared is, what kind of a person just kidnaps someone and calls it love. Little paper cuts that slice and sting. Jared would brush aside those acidic words, blame it on his boy's aching, healing head. He doesn't truly mean it. He can't. Cruelty doesn't exist in his angel.

Yet the more that poison would spit from cherubic lips, Jared's smiles whittled down to grinding teeth. A bouquet of picked wild flowers to replace the ruined roses were shredded into fragrant confetti. Jared's fist had gone into the wall, and Jensen learned to watch his mouth. He flinches and cowers and watches Jared with a new wariness.

Sometimes that hurts more.

It's worse though, when Jensen goes quiet. Jared wants to kiss the cute, little furrow his brow makes when he's thinking. Jared learns it's not a particularly good thing. He's seen it before when Jensen would make a dash for the door; when he would suddenly shove Jared - _oh, oh that surprise touch_ \- on the way to the bathroom and run for the stairs. Jared's heart ended up in his throat when Jensen fumbled with the front door before Jared tackled him and hauled him back to their room. He saw that furrow before when another failed attempt at conversation ended with Jared huffing off to fix dinner only to return to a vase narrowly crashing into his skull.

The last time he sees it before he caught on to what it meant is waking up in the middle of the night to a thump and Jensen halfway out the window with the sheets knotted into a crude rope. Smothering the pang the sight brings him, he yanks Jensen back inside and expresses his disappointment in hurt lectures and tearing his rope in half to show how flimsy the sheets are and how easily Jensen could have fallen and hurt himself.

“Do you see how I gotta protect you, baby? Even when it's from yourself?”

This isn't what he imagined, especially because Jensen won't let Jared come anywhere near him. Not in any real, meaningful sense. They move like opposing magnets: Jared comes closer and Jensen scurries away. Jensen even changes his own bandage until the swelling goes down to a scab hidden by dirty blond hair. His boy would rather sleep on the floor than share a bed with Jared. It stings. Jared's scarred fingertips itch, and he thinks of broken glass.

He wants to touch. He needs to touch, and the fact that he's once again not allowed weighs heavy on him. It becomes crushing with the added stress he can't leave Jensen alone, not for anything longer than to shower or cook. His daddy was right when he told him, _“Love can come in an instant and last forever, but trust... trust takes time._ _That's how it was with your mama_ _.”_

With a swollen heart, Jared accepts the sad truth of that statement. Something needs to be done.

The pills come from a parking lot transaction. Prescription-grade. He feels awful grinding a couple up and sprinkling the white powder into Jensen's soup. Jared deliberately forgoes giving him breakfast to ensure he eats. Guilt gnaws at his own appetite as the spoon moves to Jensen's mouth in a mechanical circuit. If he tastes anything off, he doesn't show it. His expression most days is a suspicious glare. He finishes it all, and it takes only minutes for his eyelids to droop and he slumps against the headboard, out cold. A small thrill of victory. Jared just needs him to sleep and stay asleep for a little while.

He'd been planning this. He collects his purchases from the hardware store and online and heads down, down, down creaking stairs to the basement and gets to work.

Towering boxes of dusty Christmas decorations and old junk move to the shed. They make way for a new bed, something to christen and make their own. He struggles maneuvering it down the narrow staircase. Tools are broken out to tackle his father's abandoned project of gifting his mama an extra bathroom, because she always complained about the running water of the washer triggering her bladder and having to run upstairs halfway through folding laundry. Now remains the mildew yellow sink in the corner and the bare plumbing for a toilet and a dripping pipe jutting out of the ceiling over a drain on the floor. All it needs are new fixtures and a new low-flow. Jared surprises himself that it all seems to be in working order, even if the water temperature is temperamental.

The hammer drill makes the most noise, loud and grating. By the time he's finished and climbing upstairs, tingles are still dancing up his arm from the vibrations. His sleeping beauty is still passed out. A sweet line of drool oozes like honey onto the pillow beneath his head. He doesn't stir in the slightest when Jared takes him up into his arms. Warm huffs of breath tickles Jared's neck with every other whining step downward.

When the manacle clicks around Jensen's delicate angle, it rivals the thrill of a wedding ring.

His fingers drift along the soft, golden hairs of Jensen's calf and skip cool steel to the pale arch of his foot and the elegant bones of one-two-three-four-five toes. Even in sleep, Jensen jerks his leg away from his touch. The surge in his veins is red-raw like a howl. Like betrayal. Things are going to get better, whether Jensen wants it to or not.

But that's okay, Jared wants it enough for the both of them.

:::

Jensen panics and screams for days.

Jared tries to calmly explain to him how this is necessary. That things need to be this way for them - “for us”- but Jensen won't hear any of it. He begs and yanks on the chain tethering him to the concrete floor. Each time Jared draws near, he utilizes the ten foot give of his shackles to keep as far away from him as possible. The boy's a broken record of _pleases, stay ways,_ and _let me gos_. It's a record that skips and scratches but relentlessly plays on and on. It _picks_ at Jared. Rattling chains chase him up the basement stairs more often than not.

Work keeps calling. His supervisor is concerned, wondering when they are going to see him back. He's just about plowed through his vacation days and would have to move onto sick days. Maybe he could request to work remotely, making up some family emergency or something. Thanks to Jensen, he can't ever fathom going back. Jared was dying in that cubicle.

His wife calls more.

Her confusion blisters into fluctuations of rage and misery. He has a voice mail box full of sobbing pleas for him to return home - “What did I do? Please tell me!”- of screeching insults, orders to come home or to never show his fucking face there again, of pragmatic offers of couples therapy. Brandy gave her the number to the lovely therapist she and Sean used when they were having a rough patch. Jared deletes them all.

It seems she even recruited several of their mutual friends to “just check in” on him and see what was going on. Is this a mid-life crisis or something? He nearly breaks his phone when he hears his sister's timid voice asking if everything is okay, his wife is losing her mind, and wanted Meg to give him a call, but whatever he decides, she'd support him. Out of everyone, he only sends his little sister a text that he's fine and there's no need to worry.

The morning this happens, he tears out of the house and his car tires spit gravel in his wake. He makes phone calls on the way. Lots of long, boring phone calls. He sits and waits down the block from his former residence for the woman to leave, the phone pressed to his ear and following the automated instructions.

Most of the bills get switched over into his wife's name as he would no longer be living at that address. No more joint checking account. He figures she'll catch on quick when her little shopping adventure with the girls comes to an abrupt, embarrassing halt. By the time his cell goes off like a banshee to signify her awareness of this development, his side of the closet is empty and a gold wedding band is left on the kitchen counter.

It's petty and vindictive and it's not how he was raised, but things have been so hard with Jensen lately. He needs a little easy, just this once.

Easy drives him to neon signs promising alcohol. Happy hour-packed. All-American sports blare through crowded flat screens mounted in every available space. Their combined headache flash and glow enough to make other lighting unnecessary. For a brief moment, he considers finding somewhere else but ultimately decides to avoid the extra effort. He squeezes into a spot at the bar and gets an elbow to the ribs followed by profuse apologies for it. He waves away the harried bartender's pitch of half price appetizers and ends up with a pint of beer he doesn't know the name of, only that it's on special.

Shouts and laughter and cheers for the home team wash over him. He hasn't been around this many people in awhile. His skin crawls. His ears feel too full. Inversely, the pint glass is quickly empty. He orders another and another. The pressure inside him eases and all he can tastes is cool bitterness. He drinks and drinks and drinks until the day ebbs and slides around him. An almost far enough away blur.

It isn't late when his car ambles down the driveway in a carefully slow crawl. The sun only threatening to dip down below the horizon. Bleary eyes squinting at the tangerine streak. All's quiet when he stumbles inside. Dropping his keys and phone on the counter sounds harsh in the stillness. His stuff can wait to be unloaded tomorrow. Mental exhaustion paired with the alcohol in his system pulls at him. Makes the thought of bed enticing.

_But it's an empty bed_ , Jared remembers. His tongue is a dry sponge, sour and craving.

Then he hears it, the faintest, “Hello?” below him. The downward slant to his mouth curls into a shadowy sliver of teeth. “Is anyone there?”

All thoughts of sleep dissolve like mist. Puppy excitement zings through him. The basement door is flung open and his boots thunder down the rickety stairs. The sight of his moon-pale angel is a shot of ambrosia, like honey whiskey, sweet and burning and warms his belly. Jared is almost numb to the rattle of chain as the boys shuffles back, his green eyes wide and mouth twisted.

“Hi!” he greets, big and boisterous. His cheeks ache from his massive grin. Jensen doesn't return it. He slides back farther, his tether stretched taut.

The soft sound of his rough voice sparks a thrill in the older man. “Where have you been all day?”

His core melts milk chocolate sweet. “Had some things to take care of. Why, did you miss me?” His hopes are high and teetering. They plummet at the sharp shake of his boy's head.

The deep breath Jensen takes shudders out of him. His gaze cuts away to deliver his knife-whisper words. “... If you're going to fuck off for the day, the least you could do is feed your pet.”

And in the resulting silence, his stomach rumbles.

Jared's fuzzy smile falls. The happy, carbonated bubble he floated in on pops. Sudden and inevitable. The bright flush to his face boils crimson. His jaw locks. Tomorrow, he'll remember why he isn't a big drinker; his mood tended to be a dangerously precarious thing. For now, he lets himself get swept away in the riptide of his fury.

He stalks across the room, his shadow swallowing the shaking leaf of a boy up before he reaches him. Inches separate them. His long legs wobble to keep him balanced in place. In normal circumstances, there would be rejoicing over this is the closest he's been to Jensen conscious in a long time.

“What did you say?” he questions, his voice deceptively soft. His fists flex at his sides.

Jensen gulps, shrinking under his dark glare. His own wide, wet eyes fall to the ground and he shakes his head.

“No, no, if you have something to say, say it. You think that you're just some _pet_ to me?”

Broad, dizzily thin shoulders draw in. The baggy pajamas Jensen wraps himself in devours him whole. Jared could tear them off in his irrational jealousy of department store cotton. A pressure builds in his chest at his boy looking so small. The quivering of his chapped lips.

Without another thought, he ducks down to capture that beautiful mouth that's been mocking him for too long with his own--

Only for a wild flail of arms to clip his chin and ear, forcing him back a staggering step. He pulls away with bewilderment, his head swimming to process.

_More of this_. His lips wrench in a snarl. His next question is black and tender. “... I've been good to you, haven't I? No, look at me.”

Jensen moves to get away, but he finds himself in the iron cage of Jared's arms. His breathing picks up to pants. Still, he doesn't look.

“Look at me!” Jared barks, spit flinging. His large hands engulf the slope of Jensen's neck to dig his thumbs in the soft underside of his jaw to angle his head up. Through the red haze, he catches tear-bright green, and the festering shrapnel of Jensen's rejections spill out like rotted blood.

“Haven't I been good to you? I-I saved you from that awful place you were working and gave you a home, brought you all of your things so you would be more comfortable. I set this up for you, put all this together to keep you safe, to give you the life you - **we** \- deserve.” His eyes sting with frustrated tears. “I've changed everything for you, because you're everything to me. I take care of you-- **fuck**! Fuck, I love you so much and you won't even talk to me or let me near you or- or **kiss** you--”

“Jar-ed, st-stop,” squeezes out on a thready gasp. Nails claw at his arms, and Jensen thrashes in his grasp like a freshly caught fish. His face flushed a pressurized scarlet. The bulging whites of his Bambi eyes are shot through with ruptured vessels.

It's the tiny gurgle that leaves the fading ring of his lips that snaps Jared out of it. The reality strikes him cold, and he releases Jensen's slender neck with scalded repulsion. The boy collapses to the ground without his support, and Jared follows him down.

He drags a coughing Jensen into his lap, slurred apologies tripping over each other to leave his mouth. He brushes soft, soft blond off his angel's sweaty forehead. The weak batting of Jensen's hands fall away to better focus on his deep, ragged breaths. The violent hue painting his features are slow to return to their normal bone china.

Jared's ring-less hand strays down to the beginnings of glowing ribbons framing a jumping Adam's apple, tracing the marks left by his brute fingers and ignoring the pleased twitch of his cock. He continues to rock Jensen close, humming and whispering promises and dropping the occasional reverent kiss on his too warm, delicate brow.

And through it all, his boy lays in his arms with rattling, whistling breaths and remaining obediently still.

:::

Things do change after that.

“Slower.”

Teetering on the skyscraper heels he's strapped into, Jensen does as he's told. His plush bottom lip tucked between his teeth. The occasional tear streaks down the never truly drying path lining his cheeks. His twirl slows even more for Jared's greedy gaze. A deafeningly quiet ballerina in a music box doing his tired pirouettes.

Drinking in the frilly baby blue skirt that just barely covers the curve of his ass lovingly wrapped in matching satin. Sheer stockings with the slightest hint of sparkle encase his precious bowlegs; opaque enough to camouflage the ring of chafed raw skin and rainbow bruises circling his ankle where the shackle rests dull and heavy. His legs wobble and shake to keep himself balanced. A strappy bralette hides his boy's nothing tits.

Absolutely breathtaking. Jared's mouth waters.

The chair he's brought downstairs from the dining room creaks as he leans forward. The box of fancy gift wrapping the outfit came in sits discarded in the corner. Jared was all dimpled smiles and bouncing anticipation when he presented it to Jensen. Another apology in a long string of apologies to make up for the little... incident they had. Flowers, chocolates, a new television to help pass the time while Jared is away, and after much prying, cooking all of Jensen's favorite meals to the best of his ability, and now this. Jensen hadn't jumped up to take his gift, remaining a wary huddle on the bed, so Jared brought it closer. It took some cajoling for slender fingers to pick at the wrapping and sift through tissue paper only to freeze at the first peak of pastel blue and withdraw entirely. Jared commented on hoping it all fit and nudged the package toward him. The demand implicit but there all the same.

“Like old times,” shaped his reverent sigh.

It's dark enough in the basement to remind him of the booth minus the claustrophobic walls and the stink of sweat and spunk. The bare bulb dangling over Jensen like a halo -like a good idea- doesn't provide enough light. The single source of light creates too many shadows. He wants to see all of Jensen, every inch of him, memorize them like a test and brand it into his heart like a keepsake. This is his church he comes to worship. The seed that planted their love. It's like coming home.

There's no money slot and no glass to separate them, Jared has to remind himself of that with a jittery swipe over his lips.

Scarred fingertips reach out to feel the ticklish ruffles of the skirt. The boy jerks from the touch with a startled yelp. His ankle gives at an awkward angle, and he stumbles to recover. Jared's hands shoot out to steady him by the hips -feeling soft skin and sharp bone- but Jensen lurches out of his hold to tumble down. The smack of knees and palms loud on concrete. The chain clatters with Jensen's mad scrambling to put his back to the wall. His flat chest heaving, stockings soiled and torn at the knees, and his skirt twisted up around his torso and exposing the soft bulge in his panties.

Jared hovers over him, stunned and blindingly hard.

“S-sorry,” Jensen babbles, his face terror-stricken. “I'm sorry. I'm not used to...” The stiletto heels cling to his angry red feet. “Please, don't be mad. I'm sorry!”

“Hey, no,” he murmurs. Hazel eyes soft and steady as he crouches down to his boy's level. His own knees creak before they touch down on the cold floor. He crawls forward. Bowed, glittering legs jerk in reflex as if to kick out but decide against it. The discolored marks around Jensen's neck are now a sickly green to match his eyes. “You don't need to apologize. Are you hurt?”

Jensen's head shakes slow, cautious. His chin wobbles, and his fists shake in his lap, yet he remains still when Jared reaches out and draws the shoes off with the reassurance that they'll become easier with practice. He stiffens to a barely contained tremor once Jared comes even closer, crouched over him. Tension thrums through him. Jared feels it when he dips into the crook of his arm, up his twitching bicep, and slides the fallen strap of his bralette back to where it slipped from his freckled shoulder. His fingers linger there. Jensen's breath hitches, and Jared looks up, their faces close. So close. Heat pulses up Jared's neck and prickles his scalp.

_This is it_ , he thinks in a rush of excitement. He's so close, and Jensen knows better than to push him away. Sometimes Jared lays awake at night thinking the rejection could kill them both. But no, it couldn't happen. It wouldn't. Jared isn't alone in this; Jensen must feel it, too, by the way his wet lashes frame the unblinking, hunted green of his eyes and the quivering purse of his mouth, pushing out his pink, pink lips in the most tempting, irresistible way.

Who is Jared to resist any longer?

His heart pounds in his ears, drowning out the boy's whimper. Jensen tries to turn his head, but Jared takes him by the chin and reels him back. When their mouths finally do touch, it's warm and so, velvet soft. It's the rainbow glass that sliced up his fingers, slicking them in hot blood, yet at the same time the cool water that washed the throbbing pain away. It's the wonder of a first kiss and coming alive after being lost-lost-lost. He doesn't know how he waited for so long or how he could function properly ever again.

When he eases back with a drugged grin, he watches as a fresh wave of salt swells and bubbles over red-rimmed eyes, dipping into the dark hollows beneath them. Sallow cheeks blushing. Jared's heart swells to a stretched, fragile muscle on the brink of a messy, gory explosion. An over-joyed, hiccup of a laugh escapes his tingling lips.

He cups the side of Jensen's pretty face, his hand eclipsing his head. Tender thumb swipes take care of most of the tears. He finds he's shaking himself when he suggests they take this to the bed.

Jensen's shaking more. His teeth practically chatter around his weak, “Please, don't.”

“I'll be gentle,” Jared reassures in a hushed promise as he hefts his dead weight up and lays him out of the bed.

Jared is, after all, a gentle man.

Jensen lays there board stiff as Jared prowls up the slim length of him. So beautiful, all that pale, supple skin. Jared breathes in the intoxicating scent of him, from his groin, up the bird flutter of his sternum, up behind the dark, hidden place behind his ear. The pleased hum buzzing behind his lips spreads slow molasses over his boy's lush mouth. Jared needs to dive inside, would need to bite off the tip of that elusive tongue that hasn't yet come alive to play with his own, swallow Jensen's muffled screams along with that bit of flesh and forever keeping a small part of his angel inside Jared. Like holy communion.

But Jared could never hurt him. Perfection is Jensen, and he must be preserved, protected. No one else could love Jensen the way Jared can.

Jensen cries the first time they make love.

Despite his best efforts, Jared figures it must sting a little with it being the boy's first time and all. He'd bucked like a wild thing when his panties came down. His genitals a cute sight of soft cock and smooth balls against freshly shaven skin. Jared pets at the pink tip like a kitten's nose, eliciting a twitch of movement but not much else before he moves lower. Jensen goes cornered animal still at the first dry touch to his hole, then kicks and writhes with each saliva-dripping finger delving into tight, too tight heat. Jared has to put a comforting hand up up up until it lighted upon a jumping Adam's apple, feeling the vibrations of every gasp and pained squeak and a small patch of stubble Jensen must have missed. Once Jared finally enters him though... His boy's screams drown out the jarring clank-clank-clank of chains and Jared's euphoric chants of _love you-love you-love you_ as Jared's cocks carves a place inside of Jensen just for him.

Heaven on Earth, he finally found it.

Now, he's plastered along Jensen's curved spine, panting and positively floating on air. Big spoon, little spoon. No offending inch of space separating them. The jutting wings of his angel's shoulder blades shudder under his sweet, wandering kisses. Jensen convulses in the adamant circle of his arms. Jared noses at the cold sweat nape of his neck, his smile nipping at the light scatter of more freckles there. Jensen's hair is getting longer and soon this constellation of beauty spots would become a secret known only to Jared. In the sticky nestle of Jensen's ass cheeks, his dick jerks feebly at the knowledge.

If only he was a little younger... They would go again, just not quite as soon as he would like.

Broken sobs he's been too blissed out to pay attention to spike in volume and hit his ears like a wrong note in a symphony. Happiness flickers with the bulb hanging over them.

“Oh, sweetheart...” He rises up onto his elbow. The arm wrapped around Jensen's waist urges the boy onto his back. “Don't cry. Why are you crying?”

It's a mild tug-of-war to get Jensen to roll over, his face buried into the pillow muffling his cries. With a jerk, finally puffy green is staring up at him. Bitten red lips seal into a thin seam. The slashed whorl of Jared's fingertip traces the rose splotches he finds.

“You understand now, right? That you're mine and nobody else's?” he asks, hushed and earnest. Hazel eyes dark and searching. He can faintly still taste blood.

Trembling in the spider grasp of his ghost pale face, Jensen eventually nods. A barely there movement, but there. It's there, and Jared's insides light up like Christmas.

His thumb drags across the boy's split lip -their kisses during were needy and biting- and draws a wince of pain along with a fresh seep of crimson. He can't help himself. He leans in close and his tongue darts out to lap it up. Iron blooms on his taste buds.

“Say it,” he hisses.

“I'm y-yours.”

The wind howls outside.

Hearing those faint words, Jared grins, boy-bright and bloodstained. Reassured by his boy's anemic declaration, because he knows with time and a little more T.L.C, Jensen will learn to believe it, too.

They are going to be so very happy together, Jared just knows it.

**Author's Note:**

> Kudos/comments are always 💜


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